


i don't even know how i goat here

by ironic_boner



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Background Gwen/Lancelot - Freeform, Canon Era, Crack, M/M, background Merlin/Arthur
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-09
Updated: 2018-09-09
Packaged: 2019-07-10 09:10:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,721
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15946238
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ironic_boner/pseuds/ironic_boner
Summary: The knights have forgotten what happened at the tavern last night. All they know is they need to piece it together and figure out where Merlin is, before Arthur realizes they lost him.





	i don't even know how i goat here

Gwaine wakes up in someone else’s bed. 

Gwaine does that pretty often, to be honest, but this time is a little out of the ordinary. First of all, he’s wearing pants. Second, he’s being _cuddled_ , and what’s more, cuddled with his back to someone’s chest and a huge arm looped around his waist. Whoever he’s in this bed with has made Gwaine the _little spoon_.

Gwaine doesn’t remember anything from last night past setting out for the tavern with the other knights. Despite his lack of memories, he has a pretty good guess for who’s holding him - there aren’t many people _this_ huge in Camelot.

He tries to twist around enough to see the man’s face without waking him, but the arm around his waist is tight and he doesn’t have a lot of mobility. He ends up accidentally elbowing Percival in the ribs just as he identifies him. 

“Good morning,” Gwaine says, as Percival wakes up.

Percival turns bright red and - regrettably - lets go of Gwaine, wriggling towards the far edge of the bed, away from Gwaine. “Why aren’t you wearing a shirt?” he asks, and then, looking concerned, “What happened? I don’t remember anything.”

Percival is fully dressed, and besides, Gwaine’s pretty sure even drunk-Gwaine wouldn’t have taken advantage of drunk-Percival. Gwaine would _love_ to take Percival to bed, but never while Percival was too drunk to consent.

Also, preferably not while Gwaine was too drunk to remember it.

Anyways, the point is that Gwaine and Percival _didn’t_ do anything Percival would regret last night, so Gwaine can joke about it. 

“Do you feel incredible, like your spirit has transcended to a new level and your body has been rejuvenated at the fountain of youth?” he asks.

“…No?” Percival says.

“Well, we probably didn’t have sex, then,” Gwaine says, with a huge grin.

There’s a snort from the floor, on Gwaine’s side of the bed. “The only thing I felt after we had sex was paranoid and itchy.”

“Elyan? Why are you here?” Percival asks.

“No idea,” Elyan says. “I don’t remember anything either. I’m pretty sure you two didn’t have sex, though - that would’ve been scarred into my brain.” 

“Excuse you,” Gwaine objects, and leans over the side of the bed to defend his honour (he and Percival are both _gorgeous_ , and witnessing them have sex would be a privilege).

He forgets what he was about to say when he actually catches sight of Elyan. The shoulder of his white shirt is stained red, and there are tracks of blood down the side of his neck. 

“That’s a lot of blood,” Gwaine says, concerned.

Elyan looks mostly fine, though - he’s clearly fine enough to insult Gwaine, and looks confused about the blood - and Gwaine wonders if it's someone else’s blood. And then he catches sight of the cause.

Gwaine bursts out laughing.

“It’s not funny if he’s hurt!” Percival says, and then leans over Gwaine to also look down at Elyan.

(You’d think, given they fight all the time in the practice courts, Gwaine’s heart would stop speeding up when Percival gets close. It hasn’t.)

Percival’s concern also vanishes when he sees where the blood came from. “Nice earring,” he says.

Elyan shoots up from the floor and goes to look in Percival’s mirror. “Shit! Where did I get this?”

Gwaine flops back in Percival’s bed, still laughing.

“Shut _up_ ,” Elyan says. He reaches up to take the earring out, then hisses with pain when he touches his ear.

“You’ve got to leave it in,” Gwaine advises helpfully. “Otherwise the skin will grow over.”

“I want the skin to grow over!” Elyan objects. He tugs at the earring. “Ow, fuck!”

Gwaine chortles.

“Get up,” Elyan snaps. “Let’s go find Lance and Leon. One of them has to be able to tell us what we did last night.”

He storms out of the room (earring still in) before either Gwaine or Percival has a chance to reply.

Gwaine gets out of Percival’s bed and goes to follow, then glances down at himself. 

“Could I borrow a shirt?”

“Oh.” Percival blushes again, for some reason. “Yes. Sure.”

He hands Gwaine a shirt that's way too big for him, but pauses. He's looking at Gwaine's torso, although sadly not in a sexy way.

"That looks like it hurts," he says, pointing to a bruise on Gwaine's side that Gwaine does not remember getting.

"Huh," Gwaine says. He pokes it. It _does_ hurt.

"It almost looks like a hoof print," Percival says. "Like from a goat."

"We must've had a wild night," Gwaine says, tilting his eyebrows suggestively.

Percival's fading blush comes back in full force. Gwaine grins at him and shrugs into his shirt, and then they head off after Elyan.

*

They run into Arthur on their way out of the castle.

Elyan nonchalantly turns the earring side of his face away from Arthur, and Gwaine tries to make a face that says he definitely didn’t sleep with Percival last night, even though he’s now wearing Percival’s clothes.

It would help if Percival would stop blushing every time he looks at Gwaine.

“Have any of you seen Merlin?” Arthur demands, not noticing any of their antics.

“Nope,” Gwaine says. “Not since yesterday afternoon.”

Arthur frowns. “You mean yesterday night.”

“So you know what happened last night?” Elyan asks, turning towards Arthur in his excitement.

“No, and what did you do to your ear?” Arthur says. “Never mind, I don’t want to know. All I know is, Gaius said Merlin was at the tavern last night, and I know you were all going there. Where did Merlin end up?”

Gwaine exchanges glances with the other knights. Elyan is shamefacedly covering his ear again, and Percival is looking at his feet. Cowards. It’s up to Gwaine, then. “Well, you see, sire, we have a few small gaps in our memory from last night.”

Arthur scowls. “Are you telling me you've _lost_ Merlin?”

“No,” Gwaine says quickly, because that is clearly the correct response when the king asks whether they’ve allowed any harm to come to his favourite servant. Even though it’s definitely sounding like they _did_ lose Merlin. Oops. Arthur is still glaring, so Gwaine adds reassuringly, “I’m sure we put him somewhere very safe, sire. We’ve just forgotten where that might be.”

“Do you know what the word ‘lose’ _means_ , Gwaine?” 

“Yes, sire."

“Good, so then you’ll understand me when I say you might lose something very dear to _you_ if Merlin doesn’t turn up soon!”

“Yes, sire,” Gwaine says. “Just to clarify, by something, you mean…?” He raises an eyebrow and points in turn at the various body parts he thinks Arthur might be threatening.

Arthur leans forwards and hisses, “ _Yes_.”

“Right,” Gwaine mutters, as Arthur stomps away. “It’s sweet how much Arthur loves him, don’t you think?” he says, when he’s sure Arthur’s out of earshot.

“Shut up, Gwaine,” Elyan says. “Let’s go find Merlin.”

*

They head to the tavern, because the best way to find something you've lost is to start where you last remember seeing it. (Of course, technically none of them _remember_ seeing Merlin, but Gaius says he was there, and there's clearly no reason for Gaius to lie about it.)

Halfway there, they catch sight of Lancelot. Before they have a chance to get excited by the prospect of answers, Lancelot runs up to them, wild-eyed, and demands, " _What happened last night?_ "

"No idea," Gwaine says. He looks Lance over, and doesn't immediately see any reason for Lancelot to be desperate for answers.

Elyan and Percival both shrug when Lancelot looks pleadingly at them.

"Why do _you_ want to know so bad?" Gwaine asks.

In answer, Lancelot sticks out his left hand. There's a ring on the fourth finger.

Before Gwaine can offer sympathy, Elyan laughs.

"You think that's bad? At least yours isn't _attached_ ," he says, pointing emphatically at his ear. (He accidentally pokes it and hisses in pain.)

"I _got married_ ," Lance says. "I'm attached to a _person_. For the rest of my life!"

"Which may not be long," Gwaine interjects. "We've got a bigger problem, Lance. Apparently we had Merlin with us last night and lost him. We need to find him before Arthur kills us. We'll deal with both your jewellery problems if we're still alive at the end of the day, all right?"

*

The tavern owner, Ed, is not pleased to see them. He stalks up to Gwaine and gets right up in his face. "You owe me the price of three dozen pickled eggs, and a barrel of ale," he snaps.

"Whoa," Percival says, putting one huge hand on Gwaine's shoulder and pushing Ed away with the other. Ed scowls up at him, but stays where Percival put him, like most sensible people do. Gwaine obviously doesn't _need_ Percival to protect him, but he's definitely not going to object if Percival wants to be his knight in shining armour.

"I'm gonna go ... look for clues," Elyan says, backing away from the confrontation with a protective hand on his belt purse. Lancelot copies him.

Fair.

"I drank a whole barrel of ale?" Gwaine asks, because - wow, but that would explain some things.

"No, you broke one," Ed says. "Pay up."

Gwaine's belt purse has half a copper coin in it.

Percival pats his shoulder and takes out three gold coins from his own purse. "Eggs," he says, handing the first one over to Ed. "Ale," is the second. "Information," the third.

"What do you want to know?" Ed asks, pocketing all three coins.

"What happened last night," Gwaine says. "Especially with Merlin."

"Merlin?"

"Tiny," Percival says. Unhelpfully, because to him everyone is tiny.

"Big ears," Gwaine adds. "Arthur's servant."

"Oh, the one the king's in love with?"

"Yes," Gwaine and Percival both say.

Ed shrugs. "Didn't see him here. Although, I might have missed him - you weren't here very long." 

"How long?"

"Maybe half an hour? Long enough for that one to get drunk enough to decide he wanted to propose to his girl," Ed says, pointing at Lance.

Lance gives up his supposed clue hunt immediately. "My girl? _Gwen_?"

"That's what you said. You were all headed to her place when you left here, as far as I know."

"Thank you, good sir! To Gwen's!" Gwaine cheers.

"Wait," Elyan says. He turns to Ed and points to his ear. "You know anything about this?"

Ed snorts. "No, and I'd definitely remember something that looked _that_ ridiculous."

Elyan looks wounded. Gwaine feels mildly vindicated for Elyan's earlier insults.

*

"Oh, goodness, you're back," Gwen says when she opens the door. 

"Hello," says Lancelot.

"Hi," Gwen says, smiling and blushing up at him. It's sappy and lovesick enough that it makes Gwaine glance down at her left hand, and he notices the other knights doing the same thing. Her fingers are bare, though - no ring. Lancelot looks confused and slightly disappointed.

Gwen doesn't notice them looking, because she's too busy staring over Lancelot's shoulder, frowning. "Elyan, _what_ did you do to your ear?"

"Damn it," Elyan says. "You don't know anything about it, either?"

"No," Gwen says. "How did you manage to forget... that?" she asks, waving to encompass the earring, the slightly swollen ear, and the massive bloodstain on Elyan's shirt.

"We were a little bit drunk, all right?" Elyan says.

"Well, I knew _that_ ," Gwen says, glancing at Lance. "Have you forgotten last night too?"

Gwaine whistles, smirking, and then yelps when Lance and Elyan stomp on his feet. (See. This is why Percival is his favourite. Well. This and everything else.)

"Um. Well. Yes," Lance admits. "None of us can remember anything."

"I suppose you'd better come in, then," Gwen says.

She leads them into her small house and they sit around the kitchen table, Elyan on the bench beside Gwen and Leon across from her, and Gwaine between Leon and Percival, squished up against Percival's warm, distracting side.

Gwaine eventually starts paying attention to Gwen's story of how Lance - _just_ Lance - came to visit her last night.

"So, well, you had..." Gwen gestures at the ring on Lance's finger. "And you went down on one knee, and asked me."

"And what did you say?" Lancelot asks.

"Well, I said you were very drunk and you should ask me some other time!" Gwen says. "You agreed and put the ring on your own finger for safekeeping, you said."

Lancelot nods, then gets up from the table and walks around to kneel at Gwen's feet. "Guinevere," he says. "You are the kindest, bravest, most beautiful woman I have ever known. Drunk or sober, I know you are the love of my life. So, I am asking you - apparently for the second time - will you marry me?"

"Yes!" Gwen says. "Yes, I will!"

Lancelot takes the ring off his own finger and slides it onto Gwen's ring finger - and then, with a small laugh, onto her thumb, where it's still too large but hopefully won't fall off immediately. He stands and they kiss, and then break away laughing. Percival claps, Elyan shakes Lance's hand fiercely, and Gwaine pats Lance on the back.

"I hate to ruin the moment," Gwaine says, after a few minutes of celebration, "But we still need to figure out what happened last night, and find Merlin. Does anyone have any ideas?"

The knights all shake their heads.

"I do," Gwen says after a moment. "Where did Elyan get his earring, and Lance the ring? You must have visited a jeweller's before you parted ways."

"Brilliant," Gwaine says.

"My betrothed is also the smartest woman I've ever met!" Lancelot says, and he and Gwen go back to kissing.

Elyan slips the ring off of Gwen's thumb and looks for the jeweller's mark inside. "I recognize this," he says. "I know where this place is."

"To the jeweller's!" Gwaine cries.

"Er," Lancelot says. He looks between the knights and Gwen, and then asks the knights, "You don't really need me, right?"

"Nah," Gwaine says, and winks. "Have fun!"

Elyan and Lancelot both make loud objections about Gwen's honour. Gwen winks back.

*

The jeweller is extremely agitated even _before_ he sees them, pacing angrily around his small shop and holding a bat. When he catches sight of Gwaine, Elyan, and Percival, though, he turns reddish-purple with fury. He stalks up and gets right in their faces - or, as close as he can get, being at least half a foot shorter than even Elyan.

"You _thief_ ," he accuses Gwaine, poking him in the chest with the bat. "What are you doing back here, huh?"

"What did _I_ steal?" Gwaine asks indignantly. To his knowledge, he hasn't acquired any new jewellery.

"An earring," the jeweller says. " _That_ earring." He points at Elyan's ear. With the bat. Gwaine is beginning to feel somewhat threatened. "I'll have it back now, or else I'm calling the guard."

"Are you saying _Gwaine_ put this bloody hole in my ear?" Elyan demands.

"I don't know and I don’t care," the jeweller says. "I just want the earring back."

He holds out his palm, waiting.

"Look," Elyan says, backing away. "It's not healed yet! It'll hurt if I take it out now."

"Well, you should've thought of that," the jeweller says, "before you let this fool stick stolen property into your ear!"

Elyan covers his ear up. "Why doesn't Gwaine just pay you for the earring, and we'll call it even?"

"He'd have to pay me for the matching earring, too," the jeweller says. "I can't sell them if they're not a set."

"You know I spend all my money as soon as I get it," Gwaine says. "I can't even afford one. Otherwise I'd have some piercings myself. Though not in the ear." 

Everyone ignores this.

Percival removes Elyan's hands from shielding his ear. "Stay still," he says, and then very slowly and carefully draws the earring out of Elyan's ear. "Good job," he says when he gets it out, patting a wincing Elyan on the shoulder.

He drops the earring into the jeweller's hands.

The jeweller accepts it, grimacing at little at the blood covering it.

"Now out!" he orders, and raises his bat.

They run for it, the jeweller pursuing. They dart into an alleyway directly outside the shop, and then end up jogging down a small dark alleyway with no exit in sight.

After running for about a minute, they slow down, no longer pursued. Gwaine looks around the shadowy alley. Something about the teeming pile of garbage outside a tavern with a skewed, misspelled sign seems oddly familiar.

Of course, Gwaine has been to most of the sketchiest parts of Camelot, so just because he's been here before doesn't mean they were here last night.

"Does anyone else recognize this place?" he asks.

"No," Elyan says.

"I remember the kittens," Percival says, pointing at a bunch of tiny, scraggly things at the edge of the rubbish heap. "The jeweller chased us here last night, too. I gave the kittens some food, poor little things."

Gwaine's not actually 100% sure those are kittens - he thinks they could be huge rats - but he won't ruin Percival's dreams.

"We should look around," Elyan says. "If we lost Merlin in a place like this..."

Gwaine winces. This is definitely not the sort of place where one should lose track of the king's favourite defenceless fool.

They proceed down the alleyway, looking for any clues of their presence, or any flash of the red fabric of Merlin's usual neckerchief. As they walk, they head further into darkness as the alleyway gets narrower, and the activities going on to the sides of the alley and in the shops and inns get ever more illegal.

"Should we do something?" Percival whispers, flicking his eyes towards a group of hooded figures holding a severed hand over a bubbling cauldron and chanting.

"It's a little too late to help whoever's hand that was," Gwaine says.

"We're outnumbered by criminals down here," Elyan adds. "Let's not start any fights without a very good reason."

They sidle past the hooded chanters, keeping their heads down.

A little ways down the road, a youth taking a chamber pot out of a tavern and dumping it onto the road looks closely at them. Elyan's hand goes to his sword, Percival steps out a bit in front of them both, and Gwaine just grins at the boy.

Recognition sparks in his eyes. "The victorious knights return!" he cries, and then snorts with laughter.

Percival and Elyan relax a bit, and Gwaine ups the charm on his grin. "So, you remember us, do you?"

"Yeah," the boy says. "Not surprised you don't seem to remember me - you lot were _smashed_."

"Apparently," Gwaine agrees. He reaches into his purse, remember it's empty, and swiftly pickpockets Elyan. Holding up a couple coins, he says, "Yours, if you fill us in on what happened last night."

The boy nods. "All right, come on in, then."

He turns and disappears back into the tavern. Elyan promptly smacks Gwaine upside the head.

"Hey!" Gwaine says. 

"You're paying me back," Elyan tells him, before following the boy into the tavern.

It's dim inside, but not dark enough to hide the dirtiness, or the evidence of drugs and illegal gambling. The boy perches on a table - it's cleaner than the chairs - and all the knights decide to keep standing.

"You were all already completely drunk when you got here," the boy says. "And there was more of you. A man nearly as tall as you, with funny hair," he says, pointing at Percival.

"Leon?" Elyan suggests.

"Dunno," the boy says.

"Leon's hair isn't funny," Gwaine argues. "It's pretty nice. Solid second place."

"And our other companion, Merlin?" Percival asks the boy.

He snorts. "Right. Merlin. You kept winning and losing him. I think you left with him in the end, though."

"We were betting _Merlin_?" Gwaine asks, horrified.

"Yup." The boy seems completely unconcerned. "It's not unusual in here. People run out of money, they bet whatever they have on them. The big one would win him at wrestling, and then you'd lose him at cards. I definitely remember you leaving with him, though," the boy says, eyes lighting up, "because you put your shirt on him, because you said you didn't want him to catch a chill!" He laughs like this is the most ridiculous thing Gwaine could have done. “He didn’t like it much, and kicked you pretty hard.”

"Right," Gwaine says. Well, Merlin _is_ usually cold, so it's not _that_ strange of a thing for drunk-Gwaine to do. And Merlin can get offended by the strangest things. "Well, we've since lost him. Anything else you can tell us that'll help us find him?"

The boy thinks for a minute, and then shakes his head. "Sorry."

Gwaine slides over Elyan's money, and they - thankfully - get to leave the disgusting tavern. They emerge into the street outside, and turn to stare at each other.

"We _bet Merlin_ ," Gwaine says. "We're horrible people."

"Yeah," Elyan says.

They're quiet for a minute.

"The important thing is we left with him," Percival says eventually. "He was safe then, at least."

"Right," Gwaine says. "Right! We should keep looking for him. And Leon. Leon might know something."

Just as Gwaine says it, a familiar figure comes stumbling out of the building next to the disgusting tavern - a tall man with _very_ funny hair.

"Speak of the devil," Gwaine crows. Then, " _What_ did you do to your hair?"

Leon squints at them, like the dim alley light is hurting his eyes, and hisses, "Don't talk so _loud_ ," at Gwaine.

Then he turns and throws up on the side of the building.

*

When Leon is done throwing up, they all have questions for him.

"Your _hair_ ," Gwaine repeats, horrified; the left side of it is cut off, and the right side is - well, the less said about that mess, the better.

"Have you seen Merlin?" Percival asks hopefully.

Elyan squints at the building Leon just exited. "Did you spend the night in a _brothel_?"

Leon apparently wasn't all the way done throwing up.

Finally, he turns back to them and answers their questions. "Shut up," he says to Gwaine; "No," to Percival, and "Shut up," to Elyan. Then he clutches his head and groans. "Why aren't all of you hungover?"

"No offence, fearless leader," Gwaine says. "But it's because you're old."

"Gwaine!" Percival scolds.

It's still true.

Leon is now patting his head where he'd clutched at it, apparently befuddled by the texture of the shaved side of his head. "What _did_ I do to my hair?" he asks in horror, eyes flitting around as if he's trying to look at his own hair.

"Desecrated it," Gwaine says. He pats Leon's shoulder. "I'm so sorry for your loss."

"All right, enough with the hair," Elyan says. "Let's go in the brothel."

Gwaine looks at him, scandalized. "How can you consider _that_ , at a time like _this_?"

"Not to -!" Elyan says. He rolls his eyes. "Leon spent the night there. Maybe Merlin was there too. We need to ask some questions."

"Oh, right," Gwaine says.

"I think I'll just wait out here," Percival says, blushing.

"Me too," Leon says. He pats his head absently. "In the shadows."

"No," Elyan says. "We're all going in, because it ups the chances that they'll recognize one of us. Now come on."

The brothel is fairly deserted at this time of morning, but an older woman comes to greet them. Elyan takes over the conversation, because Leon has caught sight of a mirror, Percival is blushing and staring at the ground, and Gwaine is in mourning for Leon's majestic locks. 

"Are you in charge of this... establishment?" Elyan asks.

"Yes," she says. "What can I do for you boys?"

"We're looking for our companion from last night," Elyan says. "Merlin?"

She frowns. "Yes, I remember."

"Was he here?"

"I didn't let you bring him in," she says. "He smelled terrible, and he peed on the floor."

The knights all exchange concerned glances. If Merlin was drunk enough to lose control of his bladder, then it’s even worse that they lost him.

"You all left and took him with you," she says. "Except the older one," she adds, pointing at Leon. "He couldn't walk very well, so I gave him a bed until he recovered."

"Do you have any idea where we were headed?" Elyan asks.

"No," she says. "Now please leave; I have a business to run."

* 

There’s no more evidence of Merlin to be found _anywhere_ , no matter how hard they look. Eventually, they give up and start heading back to the castle.

“Maybe he’s fine,” Gwaine says, to the rest of the gloomy group of knights. “He does tend to be strangely lucky.”

“True,” Leon grunts.

Gwaine doesn’t think any of the others believe it any more than he does. Damn. 

They don’t find Merlin on their walk back. At the steps to the castle, Leon says, “Merlin must have disappeared along the way somewhere. We should just admit to Arthur we lost him, and Arthur can organize search parties. It’s better than waiting - something worse might happen to Merlin in the meantime.”

Gwaine and the others immediately agree to this plan. Gwaine started becoming genuinely concerned for Merlin’s welfare in the shitty tavern, and now he’s seriously worried.

Percival reaches out and squeezes Gwaine’s hand as they make their way to the throne room. “I’m sure he’ll be all right,” Percival says. “Merlin’s resourceful.”

Gwaine smiles up at Percival and squeezes his hand back. “Yeah. Thanks. You’re right. We’ll find him sooner or later.”

“Find him?” It’s Arthur, appearing behind them at the worst possible moment. “Don’t tell me you’re _still_ looking for Merlin?”

“There were some complications,” Gwaine says.

“We take full responsibility for losing him, sire,” Leon interrupts. “We’re very sorry, but right now our concern is for Merlin’s safety, and we’d like to suggest searchers be sent out -”

Arthur waves this away. “I found him ten minutes after speaking to you lot this morning. If you want to search for something, go search for the goat.”

“The goat?” Elyan repeats.

“Yes, the goat that someone set loose in the castle. I assume you know something about it, because it’s wearing Gwaine’s shirt.”

“Ohhhh,” the knights say in unison.

“Merlin is a _goat_!” Gwaine exclaims. Suddenly the bruise on his side makes far more sense.

“Excuse me?” Merlin demands, arriving with a goat on a rope in tow.

He looks perfectly fine, not even slightly hungover, and clearly well-rested. The goat looks like it has been in some very questionable taverns, and it does indeed smell terrible.

“Good to see you’re all right, Merlin,” Gwaine says, grinning at him.

“Yeah, glad you’re safe,” Elyan says.

“Uh, thanks?” Merlin says.

“Let me give you a hand with that goat,” Leon offers.

“Careful,” Gwaine says. “It kicks.”b

Merlin and Leon lead the goat away, with Merlin asking, “What happened to your hair?”

“Well, sire,” Gwaine says to Arthur. “Now that we’ve found both Merlins for you, we’ll be off.”

He tugs Percival’s hand and starts hurrying away before Arthur asks any questions.

“You found no Merlins at all!” Arthur yells at Gwaine’s retreating back. 

Gwaine gives him a thumbs up with his free hand.

*

“Ugh,” Gwaine says, when they’re away from Arthur. “What a terrible night. Our drunk selves are idiots.”

“It wasn’t a total loss,” Percival says.

“No?” Gwaine asks.

He’s intrigued, because Percival is turning bright red as if in anticipation of what he’s about to say, and he’s not disappointed.

“Well, I did get you in my bed,” Percival blurts out. 

It’s rushed and barely intelligible and Gwaine has never been this thrilled to be unskillfully hit on in his _life_.

“Yeah, that part was good,” he says, a bit breathlessly. He’s surprised to find he’s a little nervous about this. Gwaine’s very practiced at getting people to sleep with him - but he doesn’t usually want more than that, like he does with Percival. “You think you might wanna do that again sometime, when we might remember it?”

Percival smiles. “Yeah. I’d like that.”

Gwaine grins. “Can I take you to dinner first?”

“I’d like that too,” Percival says.


End file.
